Branford woman featured in HBO documentary on dyslexia

Allison Schwartz of Branford grew up thinking there was something wrong with her because she had trouble reading.

She even remembers crying herself to sleep when, in fourth grade, she overheard an expert tell her mother that she would never be any good at math, geography or language.

"It wasn't until I was 23 that I got the diagnosis of dyslexia," she said. "Suddenly everything made sense. That's when I was told, 'You're really smart but this is how your brain processes information. This is why certain things are difficult for you.' It was such a relief to hear someone say what it was, to use the word 'dyslexia.'"

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Now Schwartz joins with three other young people telling their stories of struggle and triumph in a new HBO documentary, "The Big Picture: Rethinking Dyslexia," that will air at 7 p.m. Monday.

The documentary features the work of Sally and Bennett Shaywitz, founders of the Yale Center for Dyslexia and Creativity, who have done landmark research on the brain and discovered that people with dyslexia have a "glitch" in the section of the brain that makes it hard for them to make sense of written words. About 10 million children -- or one in five -- have the disorder, yet many go undiagnosed and suffer from anxiety and shame over their difficulty with reading and retrieving spoken words. Many grow up thinking of themselves as stupid.

Yet, that is far from true. "People with dyslexia are creative, out-of-the-box thinkers," says Sally Shaywitz, a behavioral pediatrician and author of the bestselling book, "Overcoming Dyslexia: A New and Complete Science-Based Program for Reading Problems at Any Level" (Vintage, 2005). The glitch doesn't affect areas of the brain having to do with problem-solving, creative thinking or analysis. And in fact, many people with dyslexia, perhaps because of their heightened powers of concentration, go on to be highly successful in life.

Take Steven Spielberg, for instance -- or author John Irving, financier Charles Schwab, business magnate Richard Branson, playwright Wendy Wasserstein, high-profile lawyer David Boies or California lieutenant governor Gavin Newsom. All are people with dyslexia who use their creativity and problem-solving ability to excel in their chosen fields. Sometimes they simply have needed a little more time.

"Dyslexics are people whose brains work differently, but who see the big picture," says Shaywitz. "We need these people to be our leaders, our scientists, our doctors. But this won't happen unless they're identified and unless they receive accommodations. They have trouble retrieving spoken words and reading quickly, which of course can make them anxious in competitive situations in schools. But if we identify them early, if we give them the right instruction and the right accommodations -- make exams low stress and give them extra time -- then they can go to college and medical school or law school, or do whatever they want."

The idea for the documentary came from Karen Pritzker of Branford, who has been an active volunteer at the Yale Center for Dyslexia and Creativity. She is the mother of Allison Schwartz and has two other kids with dyslexia, too. Several years ago, she teamed up with filmmaker Jamie Redford (son of Robert Redford), whom she met through the Shaywitzes, and asked him to consider filming a documentary about this.

"I thought it was going to be a short little film that kids could watch in consulting rooms to understand their diagnosis, something that would give them hope," Pritzker said. She convinced her daughter, and Redford convinced his son, Dylan, a freshman at Middlebury College, to tell their stories for the film, thinking it would never be something many people would see.

But then, as Redford tells it, he realized they had lots of good material. It was a film, he felt, that could have a wider impact, and could bring to the public an understanding of dyslexia at a time when activists and educators are striving to make sure school systems help children who suffer from dyslexia by diagnosing them and giving them the accommodations they need to excel.

The film follows two other children as well: Skye Lucas, a seventh-grader, and Sebastian Galvan, a fifth-grader, and shows how their struggles with dyslexia affected them and their families, and how they gained confidence after discovering that, despite dyslexia, they could learn techniques to excel.

The film features several successful adults -- including Branson, Schwab, and Boies, as well as Bonnie Patten of Killingworth, an attorney -- who tell stories of how, as children, they had faked their way through their academic studies while worrying that something was seriously wrong with them. All of them have learned ways of studying that have helped them to compensate for their dyslexia.

"That's one of the real messages of the film," said Pritzker. "That knowing your weaknesses helps you know what your strengths are. You have to find the work style that works for you. You may need more time than your friend does, but your friend may not be the person who comes up with the great ideas that you do."

Schwartz certainly has found what works for her. She graduated from the University of Chicago with a double major in history and philosophy and has since gotten a master's degree from Columbia University in American studies. And that comment from the expert who said she could never excel at languages? Schwartz has learned Spanish, Farsi and Arabic.

"I figured out what I needed to do to learn," she said. "One thing that really helped me was making flash cards. I have boxes and boxes of flash cards."